There are many applications in the electronic industry, such as in copying machines, computers and the like wherein a plurality of conductors must be terminated to various electronic components to carry out various functions of a machine or apparatus. For instance, in a copying machine, control electronics are fed through data conductors or lines and power conductors or lines to various devices, such as motors, audible or visual indicators, or the like which perform the various functions of the machine, such as changing the reduction of the copying process, varying the numbers of copies, rendering audible or visual signals or indicia, and the like. Electronic components or devices, such as printed circuit boards, integrated circuit chips, headers or connectors must be coupled through electrical connectors to the power and data transmission conductors or lines.
In some applications for electrical connectors of the character described above, such as where the electrical connector may be designed to couple data transmission lines or conductors to a printed circuit board, conventional circuit traces on the board may interconnect with an integrated circuit chip, for example. Programmable contact strips often are provided to program the integrated circuit chip to whatever electronic configuration is in a particular machine. The strip is provided with a plurality of contacts which can be selectively bent or otherwise deformed so that they do not engage particular circuit traces on the printed circuit board. In essence, the programmable strip tells the integrated circuit chip to perform various electronic functions by selectively shorting out circuit traces on the printed circuit board. In this manner, a generic integrated circuit chip can be provided and simply programmed within the connector assembly.
The present invention is directed to such programming capabilities or systems wherein the actual input-output terminals themselves, which interconnect the printed circuit board with a second printed circuit board or with discrete conductors, are provided with additional programming means.